This is the story I started to tell you about Shayla, before I got off on telling about that day on the side road in the middle of the desert - this is the real story. I got my first real lesson in animal behavior from Shay. We were circling around the Four Corners and just outside of Mexican Hat Shay - who's sitting in the passenger seat sideways, she has this big straw hat and these huge cheap pink sunglasses she bought in Kanab - Shay looks at the map and looks at the road and looks at the map again and about a half mile later says, turn left here. Why not, we've gone down plenty of unpaved roads on a whim these last few days. This was the worst goddam road we'd ever driven on, I thought the shocks on the Subaru were going to fly off in protest. About eight miles down this washboard road, creeping along at about 15 per hour, she motions to stop. We pull off next to an arroyo right at the foot of this huge butte, just like in Monument Valley except we're the only people in sight. I get out and turn in a complete circle - everywhere there's these huge tombstones, about 200 feet high rising from the floor of the valley. I say, my God, Shay, where are we and she says, this according to the map is the Valley of the Gods. This is as far as we go today. So we set up camp and go poking around for some dead wood to burn and it's totally silent except for the wind. We don't talk much, not even when it's time to make and eat dinner. The place is like that - human talk there is just gonna be profanity, regardless of what the words actually are. That night we're sitting by the fire - we'd brought some wood of our own to add to the mesquite we found - and the sky's clear and there's a half-moon that's bright enough to put us in the shadow of this butte we're at the foot of. The fire pops on a knot in the wood and I jump a little - it's still totally quiet - and I get up to put the last wood on the fire and Shay nudges me in a way that makes me sit back down. I look at her and she takes my chin in her hand and I think she's gonna kiss me but she turns my head to the other side and says really softly, look, Cam. Just outside the circle of light from the fire are these two bright sparks, no, more like diamonds glittering. Something's eyes. There's something there watching us. Shay is totally transfixed, staring at the eyes. This goes on for minutes until Shay starts making this low whimpering noise, like if she was a dog she had a piece of glass in her paw. Then whatever it is starts making the same noise, only like a question. It was spooky, I was sitting right between these two sounds and I only know what's making one of them. Then whatever it is comes into the firelight. I think it's a dog but it's so skinny. It comes forward really slowly and it;s staring at Shay. Then it lowers its head and rubs its nose in the dirt right there - leaves a mark, just a little bit wet - and just like that it's gone. I hear something really faint, pit-pat pit-pat like trotting, and there's a rustle like some dirt on the bank of the arroyo got dislodged, but I don't see anything more. We wait awhile but it's just as silent as it was before. After a long time I whisper, that's the skinniest dog I ever saw. Shay says, that was Coyote. No shit, a coyote. Yeah, she says, not -a coyote, Coyote-with-a-capital-C. We're in the Valley of the Gods and Coyote came to fuck with our minds. Then she throws her head back and howls so loud I almost stuff my fingers in my ears. She's howling at the moon and the sky and the rocks and the gods on top of their tombstones. And somewhere from the foot of one of those tombstones I swear Coyote howls back, although maybe it's just Shay's howl echoing in my mind.